


Dutch Courage

by Brynnen, TwaCorbies (Brynnen)



Category: Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter - Seth Grahame-Smith
Genre: BaME character, Drinking, Friendship, Gen, Missing Scene, Movie continuity, Racial Tension, Some book canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-27
Updated: 2017-08-27
Packaged: 2018-12-20 15:01:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11923374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brynnen/pseuds/Brynnen, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brynnen/pseuds/TwaCorbies
Summary: Before Joshua sets the final plan rolling Will seeks him out to make sure he's alright.





	Dutch Courage

Will checked his watch, then snapped it shut with a flick of his wrist and slipped it back into his pocket. Speed had had long enough on his own; time to find his friend, seeing as Abe was too preoccupied with planning to check that the other man was alright.

  
Will knocked softly on the door of Speed's private study at the White House, then pocked his head around the door after a minute without an answer from inside. The fellow must e sore if he'd gone and hidden himself away from him and Abe somewhere else in the big house.  
As he set off in search of Speed, his mind couldn't help but turn to their peculiar friendship, perpetually centred on the axis of Abraham.

Abraham was Will's oldest friend, Hell they were practically brothers. Speed was Abe's other oldest, dearest friend, the other weight at the far side of Abe's pivot point. Will had been happy for it to stay that way, two men buffered by Abe. Speed, the lanky Southerner, son to a plantation owner... A man whose drawling accent when he forgot too suppress it just screamed slavery advocate, that lazy slow drawl like the lash of a whip to Will. A negro once hunted as an escaped slave and the white 'master' who'd walked away from the title but who'd done nothing else until Abe....

  
Abe... He was the one that brought, kept them together. Will had been polite to Speed for Abe's sake and Joshua had done the same, until it had all changed. Joshua had participated in that frenzied, madcap rescue of Will for Abe's happiness. He'd willingly risked his life to help Will because of Abe. When a guy saves your life you can't help but warm to him.

  
The lanky Southerner's aloofness and strange, suspicious looks had been tough to break through, but a friend of Abe's was a friend of his and Speed had risked his own hide showing that knife cut both ways. They'd come a long ways together from that point and now they were asking Joshua to seem to throw that hard-won friendship away - all in the name of freedom. All for America.

  
'Hey Speed.' Will found him sulking in one of the wine cellars, skulking in the dark with only a candle and a rack of booze for company. He looked up at Will and his pink lips pulled down into a disagreeable expression.

  
'Whaddaya want, Johnson? Come t'see if I've chickened out?' The sloppy way his collar was loosed and that molasses-slow, drawl told Will just how far in his cups Joshua was. Will perched on the table next to Joshua, the only piece of furniture besides the racks of wine in the cool room and he observed Speed from the corner of his eye.

  
'Naw, I know you Speed. You're a better man that that. It's a tough hand you've been dealt,maybe worse even than those times we had t' hunt together, but I know you'll do it for Abe.' He reached sideways and snagged himself a bottle since Joshua was keeping a tight grip on the neck of his own bottle.

  
Speed huffed a petulant sigh, wrapped his lips around the bottle and drowned whatever response he'd been about to make in a hearty swig of wine. Will let his knee butt up against Joshua's, offering no comfort but the contact and company.

  
'Damn' him.' Joshua said wearily,voice blurred with tears and alcohol. 'He knew I'd do it and th'Hell what anyone else might think a' it.'  
Will huffed. 'We both followed him this far, never mind the risks. 'Course we'll risk our necks and honour for him this time too.'

  
Speed snorted a bitter laugh of agreement. 'Jus' like every other damn'-fool plan he's pulled us into. All he has to do is whistle and we go arunnin' after, don't we Will?' He gave Will a bitter, sad smirk. 'Take care a' him for me, won't ya?' Will shivered at the fatalism in Speed's whole attitude, he'd do it alright.

  
Will reached out and clasped Joshua's shoulder, hoping he'd take some comfort from it. 'Of course I will.' He paused, examined the too pale face, but for the pinked cheeks, the lank hair hanging in his face and the dark circles ringing his eyes. 'Get some rest Speed. You look like Hell.'

  
Another smirk answered him, but Joshua slid off the table and wobbled away, hopefully to bed.

  
Will stayed there for a long time after; drinking, thinking, hoping and praying.

**Author's Note:**

> Poor Speed, he really got the shitty end of the stick in the whole denouement.
> 
> I've tried to balance Graeme-Smith's desire for sympathetic by modern standards characters against the fact that I really feel their relationship held a tension at least in part due to their ethnicities and prevailing social mores.


End file.
